National Gallery of Canada

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Abstract , Abstraction

Definition: In art, the word "abstract" designates a work that does not represent the world as we see it in reality. Abstract art is a 20th-century artistic trend that sees the artist discarding the depiction of real objects in nature, and favouring the use of formal patterns of shapes, lines, colour and texture. It is also known as non-representational art.

Definition: The part of an image that seems to be closest to the viewer.

Installation

Definition: In contemporary art, an installation is composed of several elements assembled to form a work that occupies its own three-dimensional space. Installations are constructed from various objects including those found or fabricated by the artist. Installations generally allow the visitor to interact with the work.

MicMac

Definition: A North American Indian tribe that lives in Eastern Canadian territories (Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island).

Minimalist

Definition: The foremost concern of the Minimal artists Donald Judd, Carl Andre, Robert Morris, Sol LeWitt, and Dan Flavin , was how to use space as a primary element of their art. They began making sculptures of a radical simplicity, abandoning traditional composition, and rejecting surface detail and hierarchical relationships, so that the physical properties of the materials would be perceived with greater clarity. Their critical discussions about the nature of painting itself became the basis for their inquiries into the definition of the art object. What classified something as art? What properties belong uniquely to sculpture? Such questions would lead to a consideration of volume, mass, weight, and the role of space. Questioning the nature of experience and knowledge, these young idealistic artists became critics themselves, writing about their own art and that of their peers. Their theoretical positions, informed in varying degrees by inquiries into phenomenology, behavioural psychology, metaphysics, and Eastern philosophies, were sometimes publicly articulated. As Robert Morris pointed out, simple shapes should not be equated with simplicity of experience. The simplicity of forms is a disguise for the complexity of thought that gave them definition.

Definition: Modernism refers to the new art prevalent in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, when artists wanted to distance themselves from the styles of the past, and instead use innovative forms of expression.

Definition: A technique for representing three-dimensional objects or spaces on a two-dimensional surface.

Romantic, Romanticism

Definition: A movement in Western European art from the early 19th century. It is characterized by the rejection Neoclassicism " the established art of the time " and marked by intense colours, emotions painted in a bold and dramatic manner, complex compositions, soft outlines and sometimes heroic subject matter.